- beehiiv Blog
- Posts
- How Cliff Worley Leverages His Newsletter to Land Speaking Gigs
How Cliff Worley Leverages His Newsletter to Land Speaking Gigs
Using beehiiv to Make a Name for Himself in the VC World
Kanishka Kumawat
July 31st, 2024
Artificial intelligence took over at the end of 2022.
Since then, dozens of incredible AI publications have exploded, like:
So, what do you do if you want to tap into the growing trend?
Start just another AI newsletter?
Nope.
If you want to get ahead, you’ve got to niche down.
That’s what Cliff Worley is doing with his AI newsletter, Cliff Notes, which is targeted towards venture capitalists.
Cliff Notes is an AI newsletter geared towards venture capitalists and VC funds with a focus on both news and the newest AI tools.
Every week, Cliff Worley shares the latest news, trends, tools, and AI insights in a quick, digestible format to get the latest on AI.
Now, let’s dive into how beehiiv helped Worley establish himself as a leading AI voice in the VC world.
Table of Contents
Meet Cliff Worley, the voice behind Cliff Notes, which delivers industry-leading AI news, trends, and tools right to your inbox every week.
Cliff Worley is the Senior Director of Portfolio Growth Marketing and at Kapor Capital. It's an early-stage VC firm out of Oakland, California.
He shared, “We invest in startups that close gaps of access for low income communities and communities of color. I also started a newsletter called Cliff Notes, which is an AI newsletter where I feature the latest AI news and also the latest AI tools that I curate and hand-pick each week.”
Hope you enjoy reading this story!
It covers everything from newsletters to building an AI newsletter in 2024 and much more.
- Kanishka
Cliff Notes Backstory
In August 2022, Worley was looking into different ways he could create content to help entrepreneurs scale their businesses.
Since his job is to help entrepreneurs grow and scale with marketing, he figured he’d start creating videos on the different tools on social media.
He recalled, “I started this marketing tools video series on Instagram, TikTok, all social media channels.”
But then, in November 2022 ChatGPT was released and artificial intelligence immediately caught his eye as an opportunity.
Worley remembers thinking, “‘I need to switch over to AI.’ There were a bunch of new AI tools that were coming out that were really cool. Then around January 2023, a friend of mine took all my tools from social media that I featured daily and he put them on a website and he said, ‘Here's a website of all your tools.’ And I was like, “If I have a website I need to have a newsletter.”
So that’s when Worley decided to start a newsletter.
Migrating from Substack to beehiiv
Worley didn't’ start his newsletter on beehiiv, though.
He started on Substack but soon switched over after he was banned for no apparent reason.
He explained, “In my third newsletter edition, for some reason, Substack banned me. And I had no idea why so I reached out to them. I said, ‘Hey, why did my newsletter get banned?’ They said ‘Yeah, it's been banned. You violated the content guidelines.’ And I was like, ‘Can you show me what that was?’”
Unfortunately, Worley never heard back from them, so he started looking for other options. That’s when he came across beehiiv.
He shared, “I had kind of heard rumblings about beehiiv and I knew it was growing fast, so I said, “Let me just switch over.”
At the time, he shared how the other main options for him would have been “Mailchimp or Active Campaign” but that they weren’t the right fit.
Worley explained, “Those are great platforms, but they don't focus 100% on newsletters. Because the newsletter was what I was trying to do, I had to go with beehiiv.”
The migration process was seamless for Worley as he used beehiiv’s one-click import to bring his newsletters and subscribers over from Substack.
The Journey From Zero to 1,000 Subscribers
On Substack, Worley grew his subscriber base to about 100 subscribers. And, over the next year, he took a steady, organic approach to his growth by promoting it passively on social media.
He shared, “I had been promoting it through all of my social media channels. At the end of every single one of my videos, there's a call to action to subscribe to my newsletter to get the tools.”
But, Worley’s biggest driver of growth isn’t a digital channel or tactic. It’s his speaking gigs.
He explained:
Worley explained how he hit about 1,000 subscribers in about one year.
He shared, “I really went slow and I took my time. Everything was organic. I have not done any marketing. I think I've done maybe one or two different Boosts.”
Worley continued, “Most of everything has been organic for me and at some point I probably will run marketing. I have a full-time job. So this is a side project but it's going really well. And beehiiv is so easy to set up that you can do this on the side, even if you're working a full-time job.”
Enjoying this beehiiv case study? Learn how Jennifer Chou of Vegan Tech Nomad made $16,000+ on beehiiv in Less Than 4 Months.
Favorite beehiiv Features
We asked Worley to share some of his favorite aspects of beehiiv, and he had plenty to share. As an AI guy, beehiiv AI is one of his favorite features, but there were a few others that caught him by surprise.
Worley shared, “beehiiv is the number one email marketing platform, especially for newsletters. It's really built with experienced developers and they came from Morning Brew, so they actually know how to do newsletters.”
Reliable Deliverability
Worley shared how he’s been impressed with beehiiv’s deliverability so far.
He explained, “Deliverability is always on point. My newsletter always gets opened and clicked on and that's one of the big challenges with a lot of other newsletter platforms.”
Easy Monetization
Worley is also a big fan of the different ways beehiiv allows you to monetize your newsletter.
He shared, “I think beehiiv is building [their brand] for the newsletter marketplace. So they give you the ability to have other people advertise in your newsletter. You can get paid for it through the Boosts option.”
Worley explained, “You can get a lot of traction on your own. You don't have to just rely on your own marketing. You can rely on the beehiiv platform as well. And then they just have tons of tools to help you grow your platform.”
beehiiv AI
Worley spoke about how his favorite beehiiv feature overall is the artificial intelligence tool, beehiiv AI which allows you to create generative AI text directly within the beehiiv editor.
He shared, “If there’s ever a time where I personally get stuck and don't know what to say, there is one button that you click and you can highlight your text and it can write it in whatever type of tone that you want it. So if you want it to be friendly and entertaining, or funny — it'll change the copy for you.”
Worley continued, “It’s pretty cool because it can take anybody who's not really a good writer and make them a good writer overnight. I've gotten a lot of compliments for my writing and sometimes it is AI.”
Regular Feature Updates
Worley also shared how he’s been happy with how quickly beehiiv ships new features.
He mentioned, “I think [beehiiv is] probably one of the fastest-growing newsletter platforms out there. I love how fast they integrate features. Every time I open up my email on a Monday, there’s a new feature that comes out that’s exactly what I wanted. So they're building fast. I love just being on the ride with them.”
Cliff Worley’s Goals for 2025
We asked Worley to give us a sneak peek into what’s to come with his newsletter in the coming year and he plans to tap into beehiiv’s premium newsletter option and launch courses on AI tools.
Worley shared, “I think one of the things that I want to do is have deeper dives on the tools that I'm actually talking about. Every time I give a speech I usually give 40 tools in 40 minutes of my favorite AI tools. The number one takeaway after every speech is, ‘Can you show me how to use those tools?’”
Leveraging his audience’s feedback, Worley plans on creating in-depth content and courses to serve his audience even more.
He continued, “I've seen a couple of other newsletters kind of do this where they have a community and they basically show, step by step, how to use those tools. I think the next phase of the newsletter is really going deep and showcasing the tools, work use cases, and those kinds of things.”
In terms of growing his subscriber base, Worley is going to keep promoting his newsletter at his speaking gigs.
Everybody keeps asking me, “When is your course coming out? I would love a beehiiv feature that has course integration natively, which I could see them actually pushing out at some point in time.”
Since the interview, beehiiv launched a one-time payment feature which allows you to sell digital courses directly within beehiiv. The best part is that beehiiv doesn’t take a cut of sales or charge extra fees like other digital commerce platforms.
“The other thing that I'm thinking about doing is a paid newsletter and also walking through AI tools. But the course is going to be my next thing that I'm going to launch because everybody keeps asking me, “Can you come out with a course and show us how to use these tools? So that'll be step one and I think step two will be a paid newsletter.”
The ROI of beehiiv
We asked Worley what kind of financial impact beehiiv has had on his business, and he explained how it’s been a major factor in developing him as an authority in his industry.
Worley shared, “I'm in the Venture Capital space. So there are a lot of venture capitalists in my newsletter and that has made me top of mind for them when they're thinking about bringing someone in to speak on AI. Every Monday, [my newsletter] is a reminder to everybody in VC that I'm the leading expert on AI tools.”
Worley went on the explain that beehiiv is helping him land more speaking gigs.
He mentioned, “I'm probably getting a speaking gig once a week, which is pretty crazy. It took me a year to get there. But, I literally just got back from Dallas yesterday for speaking and I've got another engagement next week. And so I would say the biggest ROI has been just being top of mind for just the industry around AI tools.”
Worley has seen some impressive results from his beehiiv newsletter. Yet, he manages it completely on the side of his full-time job.
Here’s what it looks like behind the scenes in his newsletter creation process:
Worley shared, “Because I have a full-time job, I'm really busy. So I have a very streamlined way that I create my newsletter. Throughout the week, anytime I see any good news around AI, I put that into a platform called MyMind where I just collect different articles, resources, YouTube videos, TikToks, and Tweets. I kind of collect those throughout the week.”
He explained how Sunday is his newsletter writing day. He’ll block out two hours every Sunday to curate and write his entire newsletter before scheduling it for Monday.
Worley mentioned, “It's only taking two hours of my time a week on a weekend and so it's really not that much to get a newsletter started.”
Advice for Someone Thinking of Starting a Newsletter
We asked Worley what his advice would be for someone thinking of starting their own newsletter.
He shared, “Just figure out what it is that you want to say and then figure out your audience later. That's what I did. I enjoyed reading all this AI news and I enjoy AI tools, so it was just something that I personally wanted to share with the world. I actually didn't have any expectations of getting a whole bunch of followers.”
Worley continued, “I think a lot of people are scared to put out content. If you decide to say, ‘Hey, I'm going to put it out,’ you have a very good chance of being an expert in your space and being the only one with the newsletter. I would say now's the time and hurry up before everybody else does.”
He mentioned, “I always talk about beehiiv in all my marketing tool speeches, like you if you're doing email marketing you should definitely be using beehiiv.”
Key Takeaways
Cliff Worley migrated over from Substack to beehiiv last year and has put out over 60 editions of his weekly newsletter on beehiiv, grown his subscriber base, and established himself as the leading AI voice in the venture capital industry.
Here are some key takeaways:
Start Writing About What Interests You: You don’t need to do a ton of audience research first in order to create a successful newsletter. Just start by picking a topic you’re passionate about and then find your people.
Grow Your Newsletter With Offline Tactics: Don’t box yourself into only promoting your newsletter online. Think outside the box and promote it at networking events, conferences, and with others in your offline network.
Create Your Own Lane: Rather than starting another AI newsletter, Worley decided he was going to own the AI space within the VC industry. He chose to be a big fish in a smaller lane and has now become the go-to authority in the space.
Combat Your Weaknesses With Technology: Worley admits that writing is not a strength of his. So, rather than letting it limit his ability to create a successful newsletter, he decided to leverage beehiiv AI to help him write.
Worley shared, “I actually hate writing but I've always wanted to do a newsletter. I think if I wouldn't have been able to do that with beehiiv, I wouldn't have a newsletter right now.”
He continued, “The beehiiv platform just makes it very easy for someone who's not comfortable with writing to write a big newsletter. I have one of the biggest AI newsletters in Venture Capital today, which is absolutely crazy. I would have never thought that a year ago.”
To wrap it all up, Cliff Worley’s story demonstrates how anyone can leverage beehiiv’s platform to create a successful newsletter built on their passions even if they aren’t a seasoned writer.
By switching from Substack to beehiiv, diving deep into the AI space, and leveraging beehiiv’s AI tools to write better newsletters, Worley has positioned himself as a leading AI voice in the VC world, opening up endless opportunities to monetize in the future.
Ready to turn your passion into a profitable newsletter?
Reply